


with a little help from my friends

by fiertia



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Golden Deer Route spoilers, Post-Timeskip (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Romance, byleth is...byleth, claude is IN LOVE and doesnt know what to do about it, rating might be subject to change down the road idk
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-27
Updated: 2019-09-02
Packaged: 2020-09-28 01:29:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20417627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fiertia/pseuds/fiertia
Summary: Claude is fully aware he's got it bad for his former professor. He might need some convincing, though, to actually be honest about his feelings.(Or, the Golden Deer house conspires to get their deerly beloved leaders together.)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> alternate title: Get Your Shit Together, Claude

To Claude’s surprise, Marianne was the first to confront him.

* * *

He had just managed to miss Byleth, catching sight of her unmistakable form - her ridiculous coat sleeves billowing out like dark pennants as she strode briskly away from the stables. Fortunately for their cause but unfortunately for him, she never seemed to rest. On days when she wasn’t occupied from dawn to dusk with meetings or master classes, she flitted from one side of Garreg Mach to the other, advising on spellcasting one moment and watering rare flowers in the greenhouse the next. Sometimes - though less often than he’d like - she swept into his book-covered room, finding him rifling through research and reports, and asked if he wanted to join her for tea or for whatever the special dish was in the kitchens that day.

Currently, his chief desire was to ask her opinion on tactics he was considering for the next battle. (Well, that was how he rationalized his need to seek her out, at least.) Schemer or not, though, he didn’t always get what he wanted.

He couldn’t sulk. That would be far too obvious. He was guaranteed to see her later at a council meeting, for heaven’s sake. It wouldn’t be the same as having her all to himself, of course. Instead he’d see Teach’s face as she worked through complicated political dynamics she still had trouble with - that five-year nap of hers had set her back just when she’d started to get the hang of the calculated dance between factions within Fódlan. She tended to furrow her brow _ just so _ when frustrated, and her flat glower was a beautiful thing when it was aimed at self-important nobles. 

Still, while those meetings could be diverting - he did savor the process of sussing out her subtle facial expressions - it was a far cry from enjoying a cup of tea with her room or in the gardens. Enjoying Byleth’s uninterrupted attention was akin to feeling the sun warming his face after being too long in the shade. Or breathing the clean scent of Almyran pine after missing it for what felt like a lifetime. Or taking his wyvern for a breathless joyride above the monastery. Or...

Wow, he really was hopeless. If Claude was honest with himself (and why do that, when it was so much fun to dance around the truth instead?), he knew it likely didn’t matter if he sulked about missing Byleth, at this point. He knew he wasn’t being subtle about his feelings for her in either his words or actions. Despite being fully aware she was a powerhouse on the battlefield, he still swooped his wyvern into a precipitous dive during the last skirmish so that he could send an arrow straight through the arm of an enemy poised to strike her. (The flash of an adrenaline-fueled smile at him over her shoulder made the maneuver well worth it.) 

He always caught himself seeking her understanding in increasingly-obvious ways, barely even bothering to hide his heritage anymore. Twice in the past month, he’d barely stopped himself before he launched into a story from his childhood that would completely give away that his birthplace. When they made it back from Ailell with fresh supplies, they’d thrown a celebratory feast that led to him swinging her into a dance that was obviously not Fódlanian. It had always been effortless to share things with Teach - from strategies to smiles. Well, everything but the breadth of his true feelings for her. 

He must have sighed dramatically, because he heard a voice call out to him from nearby.

“Are you...alright, Claude?” Marianne was grooming her favorite horse, Dorte, but had turned to look curiously at Claude. She was covered in shaggy horse hair but looked, as she always did near the stables, relatively at ease.

_ Phew. _ At least it wasn’t Hilda. She would have zeroed in on that sigh like a hawk sighting its prey. Few things motivated her like the prospect of meddling in her friends’ lives and devising matchmaking schemes. Happy as he was to watch those plots unfold when they involved his friends or acquaintances, he wholeheartedly wanted to avoid one that involved himself.

He cleared his throat. “Oh, hey, Marianne! I’m, uh, pondering the practicality of sleeves on cloaks at the moment. It’s a very serious topic of interest. How’s Dorte?”

Claude could swear he saw her brow rise dubiously, but when he blinked, her face was polite and neutral. 

“Dorte is glad to have better-quality feed now. Judith really has been a blessing for all of us, well worth the danger of Ailell.” She paused for a moment, setting the brush down on a nearby crate. She visibly steeled herself, then said, “You...um, forgive me if this is rude, Claude, but you seem to sigh a lot when you look at the professor.”

_ Well, damn. _ Apparently, he was being even more obvious than he’d thought.

“It’s, uh, just me thinking about how incredible her...uh, swordsmanship has gotten. I mean, she was always skilled with a blade, but have you _ seen _her in battle lately?” He knew it was a pathetic deflection and cringed at himself.

Marianne’s eyes narrowed. “You compliment all of us when we’ve improved, Claude. You even compliment the horses and wyverns, especially Josie. But...you don’t sigh at us or them so...um, longingly. Judith said you looked like ‘an infatuated boy.’”

Shit. This was getting worse by the second. Might as well go for the obvious conclusion she had drawn and cast doubt on it.

He made his face an affronted mask. “Why, Marianne! I would almost believe you think I have inappropriate feelings for our dear professor. I assure you, my feelings are strictly professional. Friendly and platonic. Don’t let Judith fool you, she likes to cause mischief.” He tried to crack a smile but felt his eye twitch. Of _ course _Judith would use this to mess with him.

Marianne dusted her hands off. “It’s not just Judith. She - Byleth - is not our professor anymore, and...you know that. We all look up to her, of course, but...” she paused, wringing her hands, “it wouldn’t be a problem if you did have feelings for her. Of the romantic kind. I think it would be rather nice, actually...”

Claude was quickly finding out that an earnest, determined Marianne was almost as bad as a matchmaking Hilda. His heart sank. He wasn’t getting out of this, was he? She thought it was romantic. And if Marianne was saying this, what about everyone else? Hell, if Ignatz or Raphael started prodding him about Teach, he’d probably combust.

“Look, Marianne...I’m not going to say you’re right about me mooning over Teach or anything, but even if you were, now’s not exactly the right time to act on it,” he said. He ran his hand through his hair in frustration. It flopped all over the place, but he didn’t have the mental energy to care. 

“I mean, think about it. Say you had a friend who’d once been a student of our Teach, and this guy realized he’d had an intense schoolboy crush on her years ago. He thinks he manages to get over it when she disappears and is presumed dead, but then she just up and appears one day again, looking like not a day has passed, saying she was asleep for five years. And what do you know? That guy isn’t surprised she survived - no, if anyone would, she would. But the wrinkle is that he never got over his crush. He would try and do something about it, but they’re in the middle of a war now and she’s very important and possibly tied to the fate of Fódlan and everything is weird.” He was a little out of breath when he finished.

Marianne just...looked at him. Rather calmly, all things considered - it wasn’t like he normally went around being vulnerable and having heart-to-hearts. She closed her eyes, breathed deeply a couple of times, and unwound her hands. When she opened her eyes, it was to fix Claude with a rare, but firm, glare. 

“You speak to us a lot about hopes and dreams for the future, Claude. Is that all just talk to keep us motivated?” Her voice wavered, but her gaze didn’t.

_ What the - _

“No!” he spluttered. “I don’t see what this has to do with my - our - vision of tearing down the divide between Fódlan and the rest of the world.” If anything, pursuing his feelings now could jeopardize those very ambitions.

“You don’t?” She turned to pick up the brush again and resume grooming Dorte. “I do. Maybe it’s naive, but I...I really think what’s between you and the professor is special, Claude. If I’ve learned anything from you and her, it’s that I can’t let the fear of what might happen prevent me from reaching out to people. It’s hard, but I can’t let fear control me. I think...I think you owe it to her - and you - to be honest about how you feel.”

Claude blinked. Once, twice, three times. If his old man were around, he’d be howling with laughter at the sight of Claude’s gaping jaw. He didn’t know Marianne had it in her to be so frank. She’d come a long way from the hesitant mage who avoided saying more than three words to anyone.

When his brain resumed normal functioning, Claude admitted to himself that he had stuff to think about whenever he caught a free moment. If he trusted Byleth with his long-held ambitions, couldn’t he trust her with the honest truth? She had offered up her father’s diary to him as if it were nothing all those years ago, even in her grief. Stars above, he hadn’t even told Teach exactly where he was born yet…

“And...Claude?” Marianne looked over her shoulder as he started to walk off. He intended to venture up to the third-floor balcony so he could stew over his garbled thoughts. 

She hesitated as he turned back to face her, then said, “If you need any help, we’re all here for you, ok?”


	2. Chapter 2

Claude carted another likely-unhelpful stack of library books down from the second-floor library. He might feel like he’s read them all before, cover to cover, but who knows? Maybe he could discover some other snippet of information that Seteth failed to hide away. He hated how much they still didn’t know about those weird mages they kept fighting.

“-uuuuuurrghh!”

“-hyeeeeeee!”

The echo of a strange, discordant shouting gave him pause. If he were to compare the sound to anything, it'd be to a human poorly imitating the roar of a disgruntled bear, followed up by someone releasing a throat-cracking yelp that aspired to be a battle-cry when it grew up. It was like a comically-warped, tuneless version of some call-and-response battle songs wyvern riders sang in Almyra. He cocked his head to the side and proceeded toward the courtyard near the classrooms. One person came to mind as a source for all the noise but he wasn’t sure about the other culprit.

“URRRRAGHHHHHHHHH! HURRRGH!”

Ah, Raphael. As Claude expected.

“H-HYAAAHHHH! EEGHH!”

And...Flayn? Claude spotted the green-haired healer - who was bent over double as she caught her breath - and scratched his chin. Now _ that _was an interesting duo. Nothing in his schedule demanded his immediate departure, so perhaps he could stay and watch for a moment to enjoy the show while he had a chance. He positioned himself behind a well-groomed hedge, hoping this scene would divert his attention from more frustrating matters.

“Aw, Flayn, that was great! You’re really getting the hang of this.” Raphael grinned widely at Flayn, hands on his hips as he leaned back to laugh. “If you wanna intimidate your enemies, a good yell is the way to go!”

Flayn panted a bit, fanning her face. “I suppose - I suppose I do feel stronger now.”

“Well, you should!” he said, then paused. He pursed his lips in thought. “Next thing to do is build up your muscles. I don’t think the yells will be as powerful if you don’t have meaty arms. Gotta think tactically, as the professor would say.”

Claude’s lips cracked into a smile. That was certainly one way to put it, though he doubted Byleth had personally encouraged Flayn to make herself ready for melee combat. Before he could hear what Flayn’s response would be, someone behind him tapped his shoulder.

Despite himself, Claude jolted. Why hadn’t he noticed?

He pivoted, aiming for a semblance of nonchalant grace, and was face to face with Byleth. 

_ Oh. _ Leave it to her to sneak up on him and catch him in the middle of eavesdropping. She and Shamir were two of the only people at Garreg Mach who could catch him unaware.

His former professor's head was canted to the side as she gazed at him curiously. The mid-afternoon sun glinted off her pale green hair, gilding it white-gold along the edges. He almost wanted to shake his fist at whatever goddess Fodlan was supposed to worship because _ come on _. She already looked fantastical enough without the sun conspiring to make her look like one of Ignatz’s paintings of the goddess come to life.

Claude must have stared at her a beat too long, because Byleth was the first to speak. Her voice was soft and conspiratorial.

“Found something interesting?” Her gaze didn’t land on the (now precariously-leaning) stack of books he still held but on the strange duo he’d been spying on.

“Oh, definitely,” he said. “Raphael has taken up the task of tutoring Flayn in fearsome battle cries, it seems.”

At that moment, another yell-shriek echoed around the courtyard, and they turned to see Flayn scrunching up her face and lunging forward with effort. “YAHHHHHH!”

Byleth raised her brows as she looked back at Claude. On another person, the placid line of her mouth would have implied mockery or boredom, but her eyes sparkled with quiet humor. 

“Do you think I should assign them to rubble-clearing duties together?”

_ Ooh, now that was an idea. _

“You know I love it when you scheme, Teach. Who’s currently on the roster for that?”

“...Hilda and Caspar. Hm…” she hummed a bit, considering.

“Those two work so well together, it'd be a pity to change things up on them, huh?” He voiced the thought he guessed she was dwelling on.

She nodded thoughtfully. “I actually saw Caspar trying to not immediately jump into a fight during an argument the other day. I think Hilda might have gotten through to him.”

She unconsciously bit her lip while thinking. Claude tried valiantly to not stare. Really, he did. Unfortunately, he was completely distracted by the shape of her lips and by the sheer novelty of seeing her fidget, however minutely.

That was one thing about Byleth that caught him off guard after five years of her being absent. She disarmed him with the degree of expressiveness she showed now - mannerisms that would be minor on any other person spoke volumes about the ways in which she had changed. The quirk of her brow, the slant of her lips, the occasional brush of her hand through her hair. Small things, maybe, but important ones. 

Of course, she had seemed to show more and more emotion during her time as a professor, but to Claude, being away from her for five years made every shift in her expression now that they were reunited seem like a familiar melody played on a different instrument - strange but lovely. Each time one of his corny deer jokes or drier quips coaxed a smile or laugh from Byleth, his heart threatened to betray him.

Some would say Byleth hadn't changed at all in five years, but his theory was that she had changed to be even more indelibly herself: intimidatingly stoic on the surface, but possessing a deep well of compassion and curiosity that drew him like a moth to a flame. 

Most of the time, he was able to keep a tight hold on his yearning for her. Other times, like now, it felt as though he were drowning in it, trying to keep his head aloft in a sea of longing. There were so many reasons for him to keep his feelings to himself.

Still, Marianne’s words from the other day dogged him incessantly.

_ I think you owe it to her to be honest about how you feel. _

Did he, though? Even if his regard could be a burden on her? Byleth already had enough to deal with. And their relationship was...well, it was one of the rare things that kept him grounded. Byleth meant so much to him - and to numerous soldiers, allies, and Church followers - that he dared not jeopardize their friendship for the sake of voicing an unshakeable infatuation. 

The crux of his problem, as Claude saw it, was the weighing of risk versus the reward. At risk was the easy, effortless trust between him and Byleth. His life’s hope of breaking down the barriers alienating groups both within and outside Fodlan, which Byleth would be instrumental in engineering. The fact that he was, essentially, using her as an important player in his long political game also complicated things.

The reward of a confession was uncertain. Having the frustrating pressure of undivulged (and possibly unrequited) feelings off his chest was the only defined benefit that he could hedge his bets on. He didn’t want to dwell too much on the possibility of what a romantic relationship with Byleth would be like - _ if _ she returned his feelings - because his imagination was _ far _too vivid for that. 

“...and then I decided that fighting naked would be a good way to confuse enemies,” Byleth was saying, utterly deadpan. 

_ She what now? _

Claude looked at her incredulously. She maintained her stoic expression for a moment before she let him off the hook with a smile.

“I was...advised to say something like that if you ever got lost in thought,” she said.

“It was Hilda’s idea, as you could imagine. I can’t remember ever doing that - though, now that I think of it, one time Jeralt dragged me out of bed to defend some merchants. So...I’ve fought in my pajamas. I think.” Her mouth quirked to the side, a self-deprecating grimace at how flimsy many of her earlier memories were. 

Once again, Claude questioned what kind of bizarre childhood Jeralt gave his Teach. (Not that his was normal by most standards.)

“I don’t really sleep in anything other than clothes I’d be ready to fight in nowadays, though. I’m surprised you took the bait.”

He coughed out a laugh, shifting the books’ weight in his arms. 

“Let’s just say I’ve been distracted lately, my friend,” he said, then quested about for a change of subject. “Now, would you mind helping me look through some of these dusty old tomes for anything on the saints, weirdo mages, or other strange Fodlanian lore? I’m sure it’ll be riveting - like searching for a needle in a mountain of parchment.”

She smiled. “I’d be happy to help.”

* * *

An audience of two watched furtively as Byleth and Claude began walking, steps aligned, toward the dormitories.

“They forgot all about us, I guess?” Flayn whispered.

Mid-laugh, Raphael paused before whacking Flayn on the back in companionship and opted to pat her shoulder instead. “Yeah, looks like it. I guess Marianne was right. Claude really does get moony-eyed when the professor is around.”

Flayn clasped her hands and sighed. “I think it’s _ very _romantic. They would make such a lovely couple.”

“You think? Our leader guy doesn’t look like he’s ever gonna say anything, though.” 

Flayn’s eyes glinted. “If I’ve learned anything from my fellow Golden Deer, it’s that looks can be deceiving. In a good way, of course.”

“A good way?” Raphael scratched his head.

“Yes! Those who underestimate us so so at their own peril!” she pumped her fist into the air.

“Yeah! ...Wait, do you mean Claude is fooling us?”

Flayn leaned in conspiratorially. “No. I think he’s fooling himself.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hoooooooo boy. i had most of this written like...thursday of last week i think, but then i got sick over the weekend and didn't at all feel like proofreading or editing it. in the meantime, though, i beat my final run of the game (church route/silver snow) which was interesting. (definitely a tough final map, but i loved the ost for it.)
> 
> also, thanks for the feedback on the first chapter! i definitely think there's stuff i should work on with my writing (i have a lot of vices, but filter words are a major one lol) but the comments & kudos were very encouraging. hopefully i will improve as i keep working on this & other fics.

**Author's Note:**

> this is gonna be a hot mess please forgive me
> 
> also. if you’re wondering why i have claude referencing not having told anyone he’s from almyra/is their crown prince, it’s because i went back through the supports/story scenes to see if he ever said it overtly to byleth prior to their s-support and...nope. nada. nothing. i mean, i think he for sure wanted his allies (and especially byleth) to know, because he dropped so many painfully obvious hints about it that he might as well have, but i couldn’t find something where he just comes out and says ‘hey dude did u know i’m from almyra’
> 
> anyway claude is like...my favorite sort of character in fiction and i'm so glad to see how popular he is in the fandom! you're all gems!!


End file.
